Corvette Maintenance - Weekend Projects 2008

It's Time To Get Out In The Garage And Make Some Noise with These Six Weekend Projects For Your Corvette.

Well, spring is in the air and here we are again with another bevy of weekend projects for you and your Corvette. I, for one, have had cabin fever here in New Jersey, and I am raring to get started on some projects that I've been planning during the winter months, so why don't you join me? Nothing listed here is rocket science, and you don't need an extensive tool collection, either. The main elements are care, patience, and a sincere interest in doing the job right. In addition to making some worthwhile improvements and doing some preventative and appearance maintenance, you get to spend some quality one-on-one time with your Corvette.

Regardless of which of these projects you do on your Corvette, there are a few items that will serve you well. I recommend that you have these on hand: disposable nitrile gloves to keep your paws clean; WD-40 for penetrating rusted fasteners, cleaning paint off your hands, and a plethora of other uses; some aerosol carb and choke cleaner for dissolving and removing grease and engine muck; a razor blade scraper and a utility knife; a workbench; and a stool or bench to sit on. For the projects where you'll need to elevate your Corvette, a good hydraulic trolley jack, a pair of sturdy jackstands, and a creeper or mat for your back are also items you'll need.

As far as tools go, you'll need a basic complement that includes screwdrivers and nutdrivers, wrenches, sockets, and ratchets; ASA standard if you're working on C1, C2, or C3 Corvettes and metric standard for C4s, C5s, and C6s.

I also highly recommend you have a service manual available for your particular year/model Corvette, as it contains a lot of valuable information such as fluid capacities, electrical measurements, torque specifications, and so on. The best ones are the actual factory service manuals produced by GM and used by Chevrolet service technicians; however, Chilton, Motorbooks, and other publishers also publish excellent service manuals.

Speaking of torque, if you're doing any projects that are torque-sensitive (e.g., replacing the intake manifold bolts) be sure to look up the specific torque specs for your Corvette in the service manual and use a good torque wrench to tighten the bolts to these specs.

You may also want to consider having a radio, CD player, or iPod to provide some "working" music and bottled water or other non-alcoholic beverages to wet your whistle (definitely lay off the beers until the work is done). I think that pretty well covers all the preliminary stuff, so let's get started.

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Having the appropriate manuals with all the relevant specs and capacities for reference is a must for working on your Corvette.

Be sure to remove a single bolt at a time, then replace and tighten it to the correct torque with the stainless parts. This will minimize the chances for coolant leakage and manifold warping.

As you can see, the manifold and thermostat housing bolts aren't exactly what you'd call show quality thanks to rust and oxidation. Replacing them is an easy and quick affair.

Though they aren't correct by NCRS standards, these stainless steel bolts and companion stainless steel washers are a decided appearance improvement over the stock steel bolt, shown above on the upper left.

This is the C5 Cargo Bay Organizer. It's made of a nice, durable Naughayde-like material with three roomy compartments that use Velcro to keep their flaps closed. The organizer mounts using snaps so it can be detached easily and quickly. The small packet contains the snaps and mounting hardware.

The four snaps can be mounted using either the supplied nuts, flat washers, and bolts or screws. I opted to use the screws. A 5/64-inch drill bit will be required for boring starter holes.

After carefully measuring the side-to-side distance and then marking the positions of the holes for the snap-mounting screws, the drill is used to make the starter holes. As with everything, measure twice, drill once.

Use a No. 1 Phillips screwdriver to secure the snaps to the aluminum upper deck support on a convertible, or to the rear window bulkhead on a coupe.

Here's the finished installation of the Cargo Bay Organizer ready to be stuffed with the items that usually clutter my trunk. Now all I have to do is give the trunk a good vacuuming.

A pair of plug boot puller pliers is a good investment. They're designed specifically for pulling plug boots without damaging the plug wires, and they're insulated in the event you have to pull a plug wire while the engine is running for some reason.

The spark plugs are more accessible on some years and models than others. A ratchet with a slightly offset handle comes in handy for removing the plugs from a big-block midyear like this one.

The heavy black carbon deposits on this midyear plug indicates the big-block bad boy is running very rich. In addition to adjusting the carburetor to lean it out a bit, we also replaced the plugs with a new set of E3 high-energy plugs (www.e3sparkplugs.com) that don't require any gapping.

You'll also need a roll of 1/2-inch-wide masking tape. I found that McDonald's coffee stirrers are ideal for burnishing down the edges of the tape for a clean paint line.

If you're going with an unpainted console, then you'll need to purchase the console repair kit, which has everything you'll need to finish off your console once it's painted; the pre-painted consoles come with all this stuff already installed.

I used Eastwood's black Self-Etching Primer and Black Wrinkle Finish paints on my console. The trigger spray can handles, also from Eastwood, make directing the spray easier and a lot less fatiguing on the wrist and thumb.

Carefully mask off the chrome areas of the console that are not to be painted, then burnish the edges of the tape down thoroughly. A little more time spent with the masking will save a lot of time and grief later when you have to do a lot of touching up and/or cleaning up the chrome.

Here the console is totally masked and ready for paint. Again, double-check to ensure your masking lines are straight and the edges are burnished down thoroughly for the best results.

Spray on two to three light coats of primer, letting each coat dry thoroughly (about an hour) before applying the next one. I prefer Eastwood Self Etching Primer because it "bites" into the metal for an extremely good bond, which is what you want on the chrome surface.

I used the disassembled box the console was shipped to me in as a makeshift spray booth, and it worked well. Here the console is drying between coats of primer.

I let the Wrinkle Black dry for several hours in between each of the three light coats. After the last coat, the console was left to dry for 24 full hours in a warm environment to give the paint a chance to dry, cure, and harden thoroughly. After that, the masking tape can be removed. When taking the tape off, pull up and away from the painted area. If you did a good job of masking, you'll have straight, clean edges separating the painted and chrome areas.

Here's a detail shot of the finished console, ready to go back in the car. Looks good, doesn't it? And I saved about $140 to boot by doing it myself.

The condenser is held to the side of the voltage regulator frame with a sheetmetal screw, and this is the first item to be removed. A nut driver or 1/4-inch-drive socket does the job nicely. Next, the regulator mounting screws come out.

Unsnap the harness connector, then the condenser pigtail connector, and remove the old regulator. Installation of the new unit is the exact reversal of the removal procedures.

The new aftermarket voltage regulator is completely installed. A tip: If you're concerned about looking authentic, you can swap the top caps of the regulators so the new unit uses the original Delco Remy top from the old regulator. A light coat of satin black will make it look like an OEM replacement unit.

If ever a pair of valve covers needed to replaced, these were indeed the pair.

A 7/16-inch socket does the trick for removing the seven bolts that hold the valve covers on each side of the engine. There are three on the top and four on the bottom of the cover. These valve cover reinforcements are not correct, and they'll also be replaced.

With all seven bolts out, you should be able to lift the cover off easily, although you may have to pry the edges gently with a screwdriver if they're really sealed on. When you get them off, here's what you'll see. Well, OK, maybe not high-performance roller rockers like these, but it will look similar.

Use a razor scraper to remove all remaining gasket debris from the edges of the head all the way around. It's important to get all this stuff off so there's a nice clean surface for the gasket to seal against.

Use a canned dust remover or your compressor with a blower nozzle to blow away any cork/gasket debris that fell into the rocker box.

Here are the old and the new, illustrating why this project was needed and undertaken. The chrome oil filler cap also wasn't correct. New grommets were ordered from Paragon, although the old ones were probably still serviceable.

A thin bead of Permatex gets applied to the inside of the valve cover to hold the new gasket in place, then a thin bead is applied to the perimeter of the cylinder head to ensure a nice, leak-free seal. The valve cover is then set in place and secured with the seven bolts removed earlier with cover reinforcements (the correct triangular ones this time, however).

And here's the finished installation after swapping the plastic wire guides from the old covers. A new air filter and air filter cap with correct decals from Zip Products added a sparkling finishing touch.